Technical Field
The present disclosure relates generally to the field of digital cinematography, and more specifically to digital motion picture capture and rendering, and digital motion picture presentation in theaters, homes, and other venues.
Background Art
The term “digital cinematography” refers to working with videography and digital video. Digital imaging processing has made it possible to radically modify pictures from how they were originally captured. A cinematographer is responsible for the technical aspects of the images (lighting, lens choices, composition, exposure, filtration, film selection), but works closely with the director to ensure that the artistic features are supporting the director's vision of the story being told, from pre-production to post-production. Cinematography has a temporal aspect, and it is more complex than photography in terms of personnel management and logistical organization.
Digital cinema refers to the use of digital technology to distribute or project motion pictures as opposed to the historical use of motion picture film. A movie can be distributed via hard drives, the Internet, dedicated satellite links or optical disks such as DVDs and Blu-ray Discs. Digital movies are projected using a digital projector instead of a conventional film projector. In digital cinema, resolutions are represented by the horizontal pixel count, usually 2K (2048×1080 or 2.2 megapixels) or 4K (4096×2160 or 8.8 megapixels). In addition to the equipment already found in a film-based movie theater a DCI-compliant digital cinema screen requires a digital projector and a computer known as a “server”, such as those available from Doremi Labs, Burbank, Calif. (USA). “DCI” refers to Digital Cinema Initiatives, a joint venture of the six major movie studios, which publishes a system specification for digital cinema. The specification ensures that 2K content can play on 4K projectors and vica-versa. Smaller resolutions in one direction are also supported (the image gets automatically centered). While much of the specification codifies work that had already been ongoing in the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), the specification is important in establishing a content owner framework for the distribution and security of first-release motion picture content. See also the National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO) Digital Cinema System Requirements, addressing the requirements of digital cinema systems from the operational needs of the exhibitor. Please note that digital cinema differs from HDTV for theatrical presentations, which may be referred to as Electronic Cinema Systems (E-Cinema).
Use of large viewing angle film formats having the capacity to record and display images of far greater size and resolution than conventional film systems, such as those known under the trade designation IMAX® and other large viewing angle formats, such as CINERAMA® with its concave panoramic screen, and partial 360 degree domes known as IMAX Dome or OMNIMAX have improved greatly the audience viewing experience.
Of late, 3-dimensional of “3D” films and theaters have given the viewer the ability to “see in 3D.” To create the illusion of depth, the IMAX 3D process uses two separate camera lenses that represent the left and right eyes. The lenses are separated by a distance of 64 mm (2.5 in), the average distance between a human's eyes. Two separate rolls of film are used to capture the images they produce. By projecting the two films superimposed on the screen and using one of several available methods to direct only the correct image to each eye, viewers see a 3D image on a 2D screen. One method is to use polarizer filters to oppositely polarize the light used in projecting each image. The viewer wears glasses with polarizing filters oriented to match the projector filters, so that the filter over each eye blocks the light used to project the images intended for the other eye. In another method, the two projections rapidly alternate. While one image is being shown, the projection of its mate is blocked. Each frame is shown more than once to increase the rate and suppress flicker. The viewer wears shutter glasses with liquid crystal shutters that block or transmit light in sync with the projectors, so each eye sees only the images meant for it. Several of the early films that had been produced in digital 3D for release in conventional theaters were also presented in IMAX 3D.
No current tools address the unique operational challenges of existing theaters and other venues such as academic viewing rooms having standard, 2D flat screens or other viewing surfaces, such as walls. One idea may be to extending the viewable area of a traditional theater's front movie screen by introducing additional left and right canvases to gainfully alter the movie-going experience; however, this also increases the complexity needed to create new content and retrofit pre-existing films. Therefore movie theater owners have opted, in order to present a 3D viewing experience for such venues, either one of the methods described above (with the viewer wearing specially adapted glasses), or constructing modified venues to allow curved or dome viewing surfaces (screens, walls, etc.). The former has not been totally successful for a number of reasons (for example, people already wearing vision-correcting glasses), and the latter may not be feasible or even possible. Exhibitors such as theater owners may also wish to employ the walls of lobbies of the theater house for entertaining movie-goers waiting to enter the theater itself, or provide advertising space. Other exhibitors, such as academic providers and companies (such as resource exploration companies) may benefit from the 3D experience, but do not wish to expend funds building new venues or renovating old venues.
Having identified the above problems, it would be an advance in the cinematography art if methods, systems, and computer-readable media were available to reduce or overcome some or all of the above problems seen in currently available cinematic methods and systems. More specifically, it would be an advance in the cinematography art if methods, systems, and computer-readable media were available to retrofit existing venues so that viewers may enjoy the benefits of increased perspective, 3D viewing of entertaining, educational, or business content. In sum, prior to the present disclosure, 3-D animations have been mapped onto single planar surfaces (i.e. a flat screen) or onto a continuously curved screen (see for example U.S. Pat. No. 8,442,764), but the trick is to do this on an arrangement of three screens, where the two side screens are at angles to the main middle screen, such as would have to be the case in a cinema retrofit. U.S. Pat. No. 8,711,141 seems to disclose doing the reverse (generating a 3-D image or animation from a 2-D image or animation). No one has disclosed or taught how an animation or footage, originated or captured in 2D, 3D, or otherwise, may be processed to bake it into a forced perspective planar image and projected in planar format onto a tri-planar, tri-surface arrangement.